Yours truly at the beach, with pail, ready to dig, in 1944

At the Sea-Side

 

When I was down beside the sea

A wooden spade they gave to me

To dig the sandy shore.

My holes were empty like a cup.

In every hole the sea came up

Till it could come no more.

                                               

                                              BY ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON

Last month’s stanza from Chicken Soup with Rice was the twelfth posting. The year was skewed by six months, but last July was when I thought to start posting that wonderfully catchy poem. I thought I’d start in now with some of my other favorite poems. As it is July, and as the summer has been so blazing hot so far, I’ll start with one of the first poems I ever knew by heart: At the Sea-Side. I can remember my mother reciting this to me when I would be digging in the sand at Rockaway Beach on Long Island. She loved Stevenson’s poems, and I’ve passed her volume of A Child’s Garden of Verses on to my nine-year-old granddaughter who is developing into another poetry lover. 

Have a lovely July - keep cool!